Burton takes chance, pays for it
Driver leads plenty of laps but can't get whole shebang
Sunday, Jun. 27, 2010
LOUDON, N.H. - It's not always good to be the leader.
Jeff Burton can attest to that.
Burton had led 87 consecutive laps during Sunday's Lenox Tools 301 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway and appeared on his way to snapping a 57-race winless streak when a wreck between Juan Pablo Montoya and Reed Sorenson brought out a caution flag.
Burton elected to remain on the track, but the rest of the lead-lap cars pitted, most for two tires.
On the restart on Lap288, Burton was a sitting duck.
"All we had to do was drag one or two people with us on that restart and we would have been fine," said Burton, who ended up finishing 12th. "Being the leader is sometimes a disadvantage, and that was one of them."
That wasn't quite the end to Burton's day.
As he was being passed by cars on new tires and falling through the field, he made contact with Kyle Busch, which sent Busch's No.18 Toyota spinning down the frontstretch.
Busch, however, took it in stride.
"We all saw it - I got wrecked," he said. "A product of good, hard racing there at the end of the race. A guy on no tires trying to make it all with what he's got and we screwed up.
"We went down into Turn3 and (Jeff) Burton got loose underneath me and we wrecked. That's all there is to it."
Burton took responsibility.
"I know we had a little history together but that had nothing to do with that, although nobody will ever believe it," Burton said.
"I just screwed up. He didn't do a thing wrong and that is 100 percent on me."
Busch ended up 11th and neither he nor Burton moved in the series standings. Busch is third and Burton eighth.
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